Silver halide light-sensitive photographic materials for black-and-white photography, and especially photographic materials for lithography are usually processed after exposure with an automatic processor which comprises a developing section, a fixing section, a washing section or a stabilizing section and a drying section.
Processing of light-sensitive photographic materials for lithography by the use of an automatic processor has heretofore usually been carried out over 80 to 100 seconds. However, as a contact film, they are still insufficient in tone reproduction and paste-up mark. Therefore, further improvements in these respects are being researched.
To have good tone reproduction means that, in a process of a dot image output from a scanner being contact-printed on a light-sensitive photographic material, 95% halftone dots come to be 5% dots, when 5% halftone dots are contact-printed so as to become 95% dots. However, in the case when a conventional light-sensitive photographic material is employed and subjected to processing, this is usually not the case. In actuality, when 5% dots are to become 95% dots, 95% dots usually turns out to be dots of less than 5%.
Moreover, the term "pasting-up mark" means that in the process of superimposing a text original on a halftone original, and contact-printing them on a photographic material, light scattering takes place at the edge surface portion of the original, leaving an undeveloped portion. Heretofore, in order not to leave this portion, increased exposure has been employed. However, increased exposure has caused a problem that images and small letters tended to be squashed.